Statistical Anomaly
by peroxidepest17
Summary: Yukimitsu discovers that sometimes, the numbers lie.


**Title: **Statistical Anomaly  
**Universe:** Eyeshield 21  
**Theme/Topic:** N/A  
**Rating:** PG-13  
**Character/Pairing/s:** Jyuumonji+Sena, Yukimitsu, Hiruma  
**Warnings/Spoilers:** Um… none I can imagine. OOC up the wazoo though.  
**Word Count:** 1,365  
**Summary:** Yukimitsu discovers that sometimes, the numbers lie.  
**Dedication:** for gwingangel as thanks for the great Shuumi drawing! Also for swinku for being a dirty, dirty instigator.  
**A/N: **UH this makes no sense. SORRY I'M STILL SICK AND THUS DELUSIONAL? Also, I don't really know that much about Yukimitsu besides his being a nerd, so you know. I could be interpreting him totally wrong or something. Just uh, suspend your disbelief a little or something, yeah?  
**Disclaimer:** Not mine, though I wish constantly.  
**Distribution:** Just lemme know.

* * *

When Yukimitsu looked at it from a purely statistical standpoint—which he admitted he sometimes did—he could only conclude that of all the people on the team, Sena was actually one of the Devilbats who _least_ needed any sort of extra protection.

In fact, with his running numbers, Sena was actually _more_ _likely_ to get _out_ of any trouble he happened to be in much faster than Jyuumonji-kun ever could, even though the blond had suddenly and steadfastly attached himself to the runningback's side as of late, and as such, had been labeled Sena's unofficial protector by anyone who'd ever seen the two together.

Which was slightly odd to Yukimitsu, because Sena very clearly didn't _need_ it. He could run laps around Jyuumonji. In fact, if they ever found themselves in a threatening situation, Jyuumonji being there—from a purely statistical standpoint of course—would actually only serve to _slow_ their escape down substantially.

In short, Yukimitsu considered Jyuumonji's desire to protect Sena sort of…superfluous.

Sure, the threat of someone trying to harm or delay a team's ace player was always a possibility, but after crunching all the numbers and running the statistical likelihood of such an event, Yukimitsu found that it was a very _small_ and _rare_ percentage of Japan's population who _might _actually be able to _theoretically_ outrun Eyeshield 21 and as such, effectively trap him.

However, the statistics for people outrunning Jyuumonji-kun were off the charts. His times were only slightly above average at best.

There was such a disparity between the two that if they both ever _did_ end up in some sort of danger, it would actually be statistically more efficient if Sena _left_ Jyuumonji behind and then returned with help later, because attempting to run together would diminish their percent-chance-of-success by more than fifty percent.

"I don't get it," he said aloud one day, after he'd run the numbers again just to make sure the margin of error was negligible. "Protect him? What does Jyuumonji-kun actually think he could do if something happened?"

Hiruma just snorted. "Live a little, baldie," he suggested, and promptly used his classmate's carefully charted papers to clean off the muzzle of his gun before heading out to afternoon practice.

Sighing at the easy dismissal, Yukimitsu stood and gathered the now gunpowder-stained pages, doing his best to straighten them up (he had to put them in the player's log he kept later after all), before following the grinning quarterback out the door.

However, as the two made their way towards the field, they heard something of a commotion coming from just beyond the nearby foliage.

"Oh?" Hiruma murmured, intrigued, and ducked to the side to see. Yukimitsu followed.

And there, behind some of the bushes lining the football club's lockeroom, stood Jyuumonji, facing off with a shady looking man holding a video camera. Eyeshield 21 was pushed protectively behind the big lineman.

"I was sent to uncover the identity of Eyeshield 21, okay? And I always get my man, so you might as well give up now, kid. Make it easier on both of us, so I don't have to end up following you around everywhere you go until I inevitably find you out."

"Following me…everywhere?" Eyeshield responded shakily, from behind the relative safety of Jyuumonji's large shoulders. From the tensing of the muscles in the lineman's neck, he obviously didn't like the sound of that option either.

"Exactly. Not anything either of us wants to waste time doing, so why don't you get over here and… would you _please_ get out of the way, fifty-one? I'm not interested in you linemen." That said, the man moved to push past Jyuumonji and get right up into Sena's face, camera and all.

Sena yelped and ducked.

Jyuumonji snorted then, and Yukimitsu thought he saw steam coming out of the blond's nostrils.

"This is bad," the balding second-year muttered, and looked up at Hiruma for some sort of guidance. Surely the quarterback wouldn't stand for the team's number one secret to be revealed just like that. "We have to do something!"

Hiruma's eyes gleamed. "Do what?" he asked, and didn't even move to level his gun in the interloper's general direction.

"But!" Yukmitsu started, though his protest was abruptly cut off by a horrified scream and the ominous sound of crunching, shattering glass.

He abruptly turned back to look at the scene again—where a decidedly different outcome than the one he would have initially hypothesized met his eyes.

Jyuumonji now stood with one hand clamped around what appeared to be, a _crushed camera lens._

And as the blond opened his fist again, Yukimitsu's gawking observations as to what could have happened were confirmed when little bits of broken glass and plastic filtered out between the lineman's fingers, floating sadly to the ground like dust particles in the wind. Jyuumonji shook the more stubborn ones out from where they'd been embedded in the fibers of his practice glove.

The cameraman gaped.

"Oops," Jyuumonji said, insincerely.

"MY CAMERA!!!!" the man screamed, upon realizing exactly what had just happened here. "DO YOU EVEN KNOW HOW MUCH THIS COSTS?! THE _LENS!_"

Jyuumonji shrugged, like the man was actually asking a genuine question. "Can't say that I do. Hey, you know how much emergency surgery for multiple ruptured internal organs costs?"

The man got the hint.

He turned and ran.

Hiruma stood then—apparently satisfied by the outcome— before casually heading right back towards the practice field like nothing at all out of the ordinary had just happened here.

Yukimitsu stared after him, not sure what to do next.

He spared a look back at Jyuumonji and Sena in hopes of some clue as to how he should react, just in time to see the larger boy vehemently chastising the smaller for being such a wimp and just running away from that camera-toting bastard like he had, instead of standing his ground and punching the weakling out like any real man would have done in his shoes.

Sena apologized profusely for that—and for causing Jyuumonji more trouble— which only prompted the lineman to sigh and ultimately, rest his non-camera-crushing hand on the top of Eyeshield's helmet with surprising gentleness. "Hopeless," he said after a moment, but no longer sounded annoyed about the whole thing. "Let's go to practice, runt."

"Right!" Sena agreed, and seemed relieved at having been forgiven his weaknesses.

Deciding that those two were probably better left to their own devices, Yukimitsu chased after Hiruma instead.

"That…that wasn't possible!" he gasped when he caught up to the quarterback. His pages of statistics were still clutched between his fingers, like he could maybe use them as some sort of anchor for his poor, shocked mind amidst all the madness.

Hiruma eyed him for a moment, and then simply said, "Live a little, baldie."

And there it was. Again.

Yukimitsu looked down at the numbers in his hands— those pure statistical representations he'd worked so diligently on— and furrowed his brow. His own words from earlier came flying back at him suddenly as he reread the percentages—"_Protect him?_ _What does Jyuumonji-kun actually think he could do if something like that happened?"_

Apparently, the answer was that Jyuumonji-kun could crush it one-handed without so much as batting an eye.

And at that very moment, Yukimitsu realized something. Sighing, he tossed his papers over his shoulder in resignation and decided that it was time to actually go out and get some of that real world experience he'd been looking for when he'd opted to neglect his studies and join the football club instead.

Because he was starting to see now, that all the statistics he could crunch in his lifetime wouldn't ever be able to explain all of the bizarre things this world had to offer.

Like, for example, how even if you were the fastest man on earth, there were still things you couldn't run from no matter how hard you tried (for instance, a camera).

Or like how, sometimes, the numbers you put up during practice weren't the only way to measure your true strength.

Statistics, Yukimitsu discovered, could be… inconclusive, at best.

And at most?

Totally misleading.

**END**


End file.
